


New Additions

by ericsonclan



Series: Talk Derby to Me [4]
Category: The Walking Dead (Telltale Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Roller Derby, F/F, F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-27
Updated: 2020-07-27
Packaged: 2021-03-06 07:34:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,159
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25539607
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ericsonclan/pseuds/ericsonclan
Summary: The Ericson Ravagers bring in a coach to improve their game.
Relationships: Brody/Mitch (Walking Dead: Done Running), Clementine/Louis (Walking Dead: Done Running), Minerva & Sophie (Walking Dead: Done Running), Prisha/Violet (Walking Dead: Done Running), Renata/Minerva (Walking Dead: Done Running)
Series: Talk Derby to Me [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1820809
Kudos: 3





	New Additions

**Author's Note:**

> (by Laura)

The next time the Ravagers met, they were all curious to know who their new coach would be. The twins and Violet were the first to arrive as usual. The other girls tended to arrive a few minutes later as they had longer commutes. Sitting in the locker room, they put on their skates together.

Minnie sighed. “Think a new coach will really be the answer to all our problems?”

“It’ll take a lot more than a coach for us to get our shit together,” Violet muttered, slamming her locker shut.

“It can’t hurt though,” Sophie argued, trying to keep her tone positive. “I mean, sure, we’ll have to practice a ton to really get into our rhythm as a team, but I’m sure Clem’s gonna find us someone who knows a ton about roller derby and can really help us step up our game!”

“Here’s hoping,” Minnie replied, though she didn’t sound convinced.

As they walked onto the rink, they spotted Ruby and Brody sitting on one of the benches along the side, chatting as they put on their skates. Ruby waved at them in excitement. Brody was distracted by getting on her skate, her face scrunched in concentration.

“Hey, girls! Ready for practice?” Sophie asked, skating up next to them.

“You know it!” Ruby’s face was bright with determination. “We’re gonna make sure that next time we get a match, we give the opposing team something to fear!”

“Yeah, right on!” Sophie offered her fist and Ruby accepted it, their fists meeting and Sophie making mock explosion sounds as they pulled back.

Brody looked glum. “Not sure if I’ll ever get to the point where people fear me. After all, it took all of ten seconds for me to be the first to get knocked out,”

Minnie placed a hand on her shoulder. “Stuff like that doesn’t matter. Roller derby is all about falling down. It’s gonna happen a million times,”

“She’s right,” Violet added. “It’s picking your ass up and jumping back in that really matters,”

The sound of skates had them all turning to see Prisha coming over to join them. Violet and Minnie skated back to give her room to join the circle.

“Morning, everyone,” Prisha said, looking round the circle. “Looking forward to meeting our new coach?” She was met with mixed responses. 

“Any idea who it might be?” Sophie asked. “Somebody you guys knew on your old team?”

“I can’t think of anyone who’d be available this close to the start of season, but I’m sure Clementine will find someone good. She has my complete confidence,”

“Hey, guys!” a voice called from across the rink. They all turned again to see Renata barreling towards them, a huge smile on her face. “Check out what I got!” She turned as she neared them, stopping in front of the group with her back turned to them. Her head turned back to see their reactions. “Whattaya think?”

“About what?” Sophie ventured.

“My new shorts, duh!” Renata pointed towards her butt, wiggling it back and forth. She was wearing a pair of bright gold booty shorts. “I ordered them online after our last game. When our enemies get a load of this, they won’t know what hit them!” She began to twerk playfully, providing beat boxing accompaniment for herself. 

Most of the group stared at her in confusion. Sophie noticed Minnie looking away with a scowl, her cheeks tinted a harsh pink. 

“Alright, Renata, that’s enough with the theatrics,” Prisha scolded, taking the girl’s arm and turning her to face them.

“Well, what’s the fun of derby without theatrics?” Renata quipped, flashing her signature smile.

“Practice comes first. Don’t you want our new teammates to think well of you, to know that you’re taking this seriously?”

“I don’t think it’s a big deal,” Sophie interjected, skating over to stand by Renata. “We all know Renata’s one of the fastest taggers out there and besides, we all have fun with our outfits in our own way,

“That’s right! Thanks, Sophie,” Renata threw an arm across Sophie’s shoulders in solidarity. “I’ll buy a pair for you too!”

“That’s really not necessary,”

“Glad to see everyone’s here,” Clementine’s voice came from the locker rooms. She had her skates on, but the woman behind her did not. She was a bit above average height, her blonde hair cut short and a barrette keeping her bangs from her face. Clementine motioned to the newcomer. “Everybody, I’d like for you to meet our new coach, Molly Harper,” 

“Pleased to meet you,” Molly nodded toward the group. From her very presence the group could tell why Clementine had chosen her. She seemed down-to-earth, no nonsense, the type of person you respected from the start.

“Molly played roller derby back when she was in college,” Clementine explained. 

“That’s right. Me and my crew used to call ourselves the Hell-Raisers. My handle was Hazard. I served as our jammer, that is, on days that I wasn’t busy babysitting Clem,” She reached out to affectionately nudge the shorter girl’s helmet.

“Molly got me into roller derby way back before I was old enough to play it. She’s the reason I joined,” Clementine shot her mentor a proud smile.

“Glad to hear it,” Molly smiled too before looking toward the rest of the group. “Now I won’t be able to make it to all of your practices. I work as a trainer over at Prescott’s gym so my hours are flexible, but they fill up fast. Still, I’m gonna make sure that each and every time I’m here I pour every bit of knowledge and passion I have for roller derby into all of you. Now who’s ready to show me what you’ve got?”

“Oooh, me, me me!” Renata exclaimed, bouncing on her skates, her hand waving in the air.  
“Alright! And your position?”  
“Tagger!”   
Molly pulled out a timer from her pocket. “You’ve got two minutes. Wow me,”

\---

Molly certainly had a lot of notes to give once each of them had taken a turn on the rink. Her assessment of them was blunt: at this point their team was nothing special. There were areas of potential, but they didn’t have enough discipline yet to have coalesced and found their rhythm as a team. Only once they could do all the basic plays together without even giving them a second thought would they be able to hone their talents into something to fear. That meant for now they would be running basic drills until they got them right.

It certainly wasn’t the most interesting thing running traffic cone courses again and again, working on nailing their turns, running laps so that Molly could critique their form each and every time. But they all knew it was necessary. Having someone standing on the sidelines who could watch what they were doing and drive them to go harder meant a better practice. The results wouldn’t be immediate, but each of them already had several new pointers they juggled in their minds as they trained.

\---

About halfway through the hour a ten minute break was called. The girls all rolled over to get their water. Violet took a few large gulps before unscrewing the lid on her water bottle and pouring some of it over her head. Her helmet lay on the bench, sweaty and hot. She needed to cool down if she was going to be able to run the course again the way Coach wanted her to. Putting the lid back on and raising the bottle back up to her lips, Violet looked round the rink. 

The girls seemed to be sticking mostly to the edges of the rink, sipping their water and chatting. She noticed Prisha wasn’t on the rink though. Instead she had rolled over to the vending machine with Brody, trying to assist the redhead with a persnickety candy bar that had gotten caught halfway down the glass. Slowly, Violet eased her way over, part of her wanting to strike up a conversation, but a larger part far too nervous to do so. Instead she settled at about the halfway mark of her goal, stopping by Clementine who was fiddling with one of her elbow pads.

Clementine gave a small smile as she noticed Violet. “Coach certainly is a task master, isn’t she?”

“Uh huh,” Violet nodded, but her eyes were still trained on the vending machine. Prisha had resorted to hitting it with her hip, trying to force the bar out of place as Brody cheered her on. A strange feeling twisted inside Violet’s stomach.

Clementine’s eyes travelled to where Violet was looking. “That vending machine is a hunk of junk. It ate one of Louis’ bills the last time he was here. I told Brody she should just text Mitch and he’d drop off a snack for her on his way to work, but she wouldn’t listen,”

“Mitch?”

“Her boyfriend,”

“Oh,”

A round of applause from beside the vending machine let them know that Prisha had been successful in her quest. Brody threw her arms around Prisha in a quick hug before happily skating off with her snack.

Violet awkwardly cleared her throat. “Figured it’d be best to get to know you guys a bit better seeing as Coach wants us to bond better and shit,”

“Definitely. What do you want to know?”

She’d actually wanted to ask a question about Prisha, but Violet would rather die than correct Clementine. “How did you and Louis meet?”

Clementine’s face brightened at the memory. “Oh, that’s a funny story actually! I almost ran him over,”

“You _what_?”

“Oh, it was with my scooter. I probably should have led with that. Even when I’m off my skates I still end up on wheels. Lou was stepping out of the music building and I had my earbuds in and wasn’t paying nearly enough attention. I ended up having to crash to avoid him in time. He gave me a hand up, heard the music blasting through my earbuds, and we struck up a conversation from there. The rest is history,”

“That’s cool. He seems to really like you,”

“I really like him too,” A silence settled between the girls. Clementine raised an eyebrow. “Did you want to know about any of the other girls from my old group? Renata maybe?”

“Uhhh, well… shit,” Violet’s mind was drawing a blank. Frantically she scrambled to come up with some sort of question. “Prisha. Does she like… hamburgers?” She immediately wanted to sink into the ground at the stupidity of her own question.

Clementine didn’t seem to mind though. “Hamburgers? I think so. She also likes girls,”

Violet’s eyes shot up to Clementine’s face. The smirk on it told her all she needed to know. Clem was onto her.

“Oh, uh… ok,”

“Renata likes girls too by the way. And boys. You might want to pass that along to your friends,” Clementine nodded across the rink. Renata stood there between the twins, chatting animatedly with Sophie as Minnie quietly listened.

Violet was too flustered to really take in what Clementine had last said. Her gaze was locked to the floor, her cheeks hot. “Yeah, sounds good. I’d better go… find my helmet,”

“OK. It was good talking to you, Vi,”

“Uh huh,” Unable to manage anything more, Violet skated off. That had been fucking humiliating. She definitely wasn’t going to get cooled down before practice started up again.

\---

The rest of practice was brutal. Rather than taking turns all of them were running group drills at all times. By the end their legs were shaky, breaths coming out heavily as they stood in a circle. Molly looked over all of them before speaking. “Great job, guys. I know I pushed you hard from the get go, but I’m glad to see you all can take it. Next time I come I’ll be pulling each of you aside for one-on-one practice while the others run group drills. That way we can really start to nail down what each of you brings to the team. Until next time,”

They all thanked her for her help and then Coach Harper headed out. Clementine turned to address the team. “Well, thoughts on our new coach?”

“You chose well,” Prisha answered. “We’re sure to improve under her guidance,”

“Yeah, great call, Clem,” Sophie added. She then looked round the group before continuing. “Hey, I know it’s last minute, but are you guys free right now? Considering that Coach told us we needed to work more on connecting as a group, I figured what better way than to go out as a group and get some froyo?”

Everybody seemed excited at the idea. Scattering to gather their things, it only took the girls a few minutes to meet back up at the front, sharing directions in preparation to drive over. After a long day of hard work, everyone agreed that they deserved a special treat.


End file.
